


You're It

by sottovoce81



Category: Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol (2011), The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Angsty Schmoop, Character Death Fix, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fix-It, M/M, Secret Marriage, Spies & Secret Agents
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-28
Updated: 2012-10-28
Packaged: 2017-11-17 06:15:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,576
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/548497
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sottovoce81/pseuds/sottovoce81
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Next time, I get to seduce the rich guy."  Brandt was serious when he said it.  But he had no way of knowing that their mark was going to be none other than one Phil Coulson ... his dead husband.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> A friend told me she saw a prompt somewhere, in which Brandt gets to "seduce the rich guy" on the latest MI job, and then is stopped short when he realizes the mark is his DEAD HUSBAND Phil Coulson.
> 
> I took this and ran with it, adding in a twist she wanted at the end, in which Clint (Brandt) does not forgive Coulson right away, but instead threatens him with something.
> 
> I wrote it all in Clint's / Brandt's pov, then decided I wanted to take it from the top and explain why Phil is acting as he is. :)

**Tuesday: 4:17am**

**Waldorf-Astoria: Room #626**

William Brandt woke with a gasped name on his lips and sweat on his brow.  For a long moment, he lay there on his bed, breaths shuddering up at the ceiling.  Then he bolted for the bathroom.

“Will?”

But he was too busy throwing up his guts to respond.

Padding footsteps made their way to the still-open doorway.  “Hey.  You okay?”

Brandt ran the back of his hand against his mouth.  “Fine,” he mumbled.  “I’m Fine.”  He sat back, leaning to rest against the bathtub, knowing already that he shouldn’t dare to leave the toilet just yet.

Benji shifted his weight awkwardly.  “Dream?”

“Yeah.  It happens.”

He couldn’t deal with Benji’s incessant questions right now.  He hoped the man would let him be, so that he could sit alone in the bathroom and wait for the cold sweat and the shakes to go away.  He wanted to stay there until he was able to shove it all back in a box and act all right again.  Of course, he also wanted to crawl back in bed and sob into a pillow.

He wanted _Phil._

“Was it, uh, was it...her?” Benji asked, not daring to say her name.

Brandt shook his head.  No.  He’d gotten over Mrs. Hunt’s faked death finally.  It had taken a long while to be okay, but he had gotten better.

“Old mission?” Benji tried instead.  He knew a vague history of Brandt’s—that he had worked for a specialized branch of government, rather like the IMF.  But he didn’t know the whole story, or even part of the _real_ story.

Brandt swallowed.

How did one even go about explaining the absolute shit-storm that had been his first mission with the team now known as the Avengers?  Back when he had worked with them the name hadn’t even been established yet.  But after...well, then they had had someone to avenge.

He hadn’t even found out what happened until after the Shwarma stop.  It had been a side-comment by Stark that finally made him realize who was missing.  He had assumed Phil was trying to put the city back to sorts.

He hadn’t reacted well.  Of course, only Natasha understood why.  Even Fury hadn’t known about their marriage.  Coulson had wanted to keep it quiet, and Clint was all right with that.  Anything so long as he said “I do.”  They’d been married nearly four years when Loki attacked New York.

Then in the blink of an eye, Phil was gone.  No warning.  No reason.

Clint had stayed with SHIELD for less than a month as Hawkeye, running ops but keeping his face out of the news as best he could.  Then he decided he couldn’t take it anymore.  Seeing all of them, the Avengers, was just too much it turned out.  He couldn’t deal with it.  So he left, and put his skills somewhere they could be more useful.  He joined the IMF.  It seemed like it might be fast-paced enough to keep him occupied.  And it had worked, for a while.  But then everything went down with Julia Hunt overseas.  He broke down.

It was probably due somewhat to the fact that the mission happened only six months after he had left the Avengers, but he broke down in a true and terrible way.  It had taken hours and hours with the IMF psych department to get signed off for a new job in the organization.  One of the doctors had finally figured him out, realizing he was dealing with a different loss.  It was funny though—they never did get him to explain whose death he was mourning.  Clint had burned his identity completely by that point.  He was a new man as William Brandt then.  So he worked hard to pretend he was all right.  And then he worked hard to start _being_ sort of all right.  When he had finally proved himself capable, the IMF eventually reinstated him as an analyst since he couldn’t be in the field anymore.

A year later, he was working with Ethan Hunt for the first time.  And now, six months after that, he was part of an established IMF team once again.  It had been almost two years since Phil had died, and William Brandt was in New York for the first time since he stopped being Clint Barton.

But of all the hotels they had to do a mission in, it figured that it had to be the one where Phil proposed to him...

_“What’s with the swanky hotel, Phil?” Clint asked as drily as he could, though in all honesty he really was trying to take in all of the gloss and glamour as they walked through the lobby, knowing that he had never stayed in a place this extravagant before.  “If I didn’t know better, I’d think you’re trying to seduce me.  Are you going to go all Richard Gere on me?”_

_Phil rolled his eyes good-naturedly.  “I just thought it would be fun to do something special.  And if this were Pretty Woman, I’m pretty sure you would have to be dressed a little differently.”_

_Clint glanced down at the nice suit Phil had insisted he wear that night.  “Eh, I don’t know.  Are you sure this suit doesn’t make me look cheap?”_

_Phil stopped abruptly, and turned to face him, a look in his eyes that Clint never knew what to do with.  “You look anything but cheap, Clint.”  He tugged on Clint’s suit jacket to pull him into a deep kiss._

_When they broke away a long moment later, Phil grinned.  “Come on.  I was going to save this for later, but we’re doing it now.”_

_Clint followed, bemused, as he was led through the lobby to one of the windows on the far side._

_“See that steeple way over there?” Phil asked, pointing._

_Clint stepped up to the window, letting Phil move out of the way as he looked.  “Yeah?”_

_“That’s where my parents got married.  My mother always loved this hotel.  She used to walk by it every day to get to work.  So one night, my father took her out for a special evening, and brought her to this hotel.  He told her to look out the window at that steeple.  When she turned around to ask why, he told her that he wanted her to come with him to that church in three months and answer a priest’s really important question.”_

_Clint swallowed.  “Phil...?”  He turned._

_Phil was standing there, staring at him with bright eyes, holding a ring in his hand.  “I know it’s a little cheesy to copy what my father did, but if it worked for him...”_

_“Phil.”_

_He dropped to one knee.  “Clint Barton, I love you, and that’s never going to change.  So will you, please, come with me to that church and answer a priest’s question?”_

_Clint could hardly find the breath to answer.  “Of course I will!”_

_Phil grinned.  Clint let Phil slide a ringer onto his finger, then pulled the man back up to stand, and drew him into a kiss.  They were married two weeks later, with an attendance of five witnesses._

“William?  Hey, you still with me, man?”

Brandt pushed Benji’s hands away, a little ashamed of himself for zoning out, more ashamed once he realized there were tears tracking their way down his face now.  He wiped at his cheeks with the back of his hand.  “I’m fine.  Just tired.”

“Are you still good to go for the mission tomorrow, or should I call Ethan?”

“Don’t call Ethan,” he said firmly.  “I’ll be fine for the gala.”  He refused to let this hotel get the better of him.  He could still do this.

Benji looked skeptical.  “Are you sure?  You look a bit...”

“Like crap?”

“Worse.”

He huffed a short laugh.  “Gee, thanks. I really appreciate your sincerity.”

“Oh yeah, anytime,” Benji offered generously.  “Do you want to get back to bed now?  You’ve got less than two hours before our morning meeting, and I really don’t think you want to spend it all sitting on this germ-ridden tile floor.”

Brandt took the hand up, and followed his teammate back into their shared hotel room.  They both crawled into their respective beds.  Of course, when Benji asked later, Brandt lied and said he managed to fall asleep.  In truth, he just lay there for the rest of the night, trying to shove his other self back into a box.  He couldn’t lose focus on this mission.

 

..

..

..

 

**Tuesday: 6:35am**

**Waldorf-Astoria: Room #622**

Ethan held up a fourth finger, for the second to last stage of the plan.  “Then Brandt will make his way into the gala.  He’ll grab the keys from Jane, and slip the pass code to Benji, who will be dressed as hotel staff.  Using the key, Brandt will figure out who our mark is and get eyes on him.”  Ethan looked at Will.  “You know what to do?”

Brandt nodded.  “I know what I’m doing.”

“Okay.  So you get the rich terrorist to our room 624, and then we knock him out and let Benji run his research program on the guy to match him to our database.  When he wakes up, we get the information we need, however we can.”

“Then comes the hard part,” Jane said with a sigh.

“Then comes the hard part,” Ethan agreed.  “The drop...”

 

..

..

..

 

**Tuesday: 2:00pm**

**Waldorf-Astoria: Lobby**

 

“The gala starts in three hours,” Jane said in an undertone, reminding.  “Still think you’re up for this?”

Brandt rolled his eyes, forcing them from the window.  “Seriously, I know how to do this, believe it or not.  I _have_ gone on missions similar to this before.”

“I didn’t mean...”

“I know,” he said with a tight shrug, feeling antsy with that damned window in his line of sight.  “But Ethan needs you here in the lobby tonight, and we both know it.  So this time, you get stuck doing the boring part, and I get to seduce the rich guy.”

He tried to sound excited about the prospect.

 

..

..

..

 

**Tuesday: 5:07pm**

**Waldorf-Astoria: Banquet Room**

 

Brandt scanned the room, searching for their mark.  He glanced at the one key in his hand, one of three slips of transparent paper with facial features on them.  Put them together and you get your guy’s face.  So far he had a vague outline of the facial structure.  He needed the other two from Jane.

Fortunately, she was just arriving.  The elevator doors made a soft ding as they began to open.  Jane stepped out, hurried but composed.  She glanced up and down the hallway to make sure they were alone.  Brandt looked too, watching the faces in the banquet room—and froze, an unsettling and ice cold razor blade running down the length of his back.

He felt the press of two small paper slips being pushed into his hand only in some distant sort of way.

“Will?”

With shaking fingers, he pieced the small scraps of paper together, forming the face that he could have drawn with his eyes closed.

“Will?  What’s wrong?” Jane asked, sounding worried.

 _“Jane?  Will?”_ Ethan asked, checking through the headsets.

“Get downstairs,” Brandt growled at her, ignoring Ethan’s worried tone in his ear.  “I’ve got this.”  He ducked into the banquet room before she could argue.

Brandt—Clint—stalked through the banquet room, politely stepping around rich men and women dressed to the 9’s.  His eyes were on one man and one alone.

Phil Coulson was his team’s mark.  _If_ that was Phil.

Clint didn’t know how his dead husband could be standing across the room from him, but there he was.  He was standing with more slump to his shoulders than ever before, and his eyes had slight shadows underneath them, as if he hadn’t slept well in days.  But it looked like him.  It had to be him.

Clint knew the exact moment when Phil realized he was being watched.  It was a familiar dance, even after two years.  Phil had always known when Clint was watching him.  He saw Phil tense almost imperceptibly, shoulders rising barely a millimeter.

Their eyes met.

And it hurt.  God, it hurt.

There was so much surprise in Phil’s eyes—though he kept his front steady.  Few people in the world would have been able to read the shock in his bland features, and certainly none of them could read it as easily as Clint was doing so right now.

Clint stopped walking, and just stood there, staring for a long moment.  He had no idea what to think—or feel.  Phil took a step in his direction.  And Clint realized they couldn’t do this here.  He ducked to the left, heading for the exit door he was supposed to take, knowing Phil would have to follow.

“Heading for exit,” he growled into his earpiece.

“You already gave him the signal?” Ethan asked, surprised.  “He’s following you?”

“Oh, I gave him a signal,” he confirmed.

He slipped through the door, then stopped after a few feet.  His breath was coming in short bursts.  He felt his hands shaking.

The door opened and closed behind him.

Clint pulled the earpiece from his ear and tucked it into his vest pocket, calmly.  “What’s going on?” he asked then, not quite as calmly.

“I’m undercover for a branch of the government related to SHIELD,” Phil said.  “How did you find me?”

“I didn’t.  My team was sent to intercept you.  We were expecting a terrorist.”

“Sorry to disappoint,” Phil said lowly, and Clint wondered if he was talking about something else.  “Are you...still mad?”

“Still mad?” Clint asked, suddenly furious.  He spun around to face his undead husband.  “What the _hell_ are you talking about?  Of course I’m mad!  You fucking _died_!  You _died_ , and now you’re _alive_ , and how was I supposed to know?  Were you ever going to tell me?  Or was I only part of your persona as Phil Coulson, badass SHIELD Agent?”

Phil looked like he had swallowed something bad.  He looked confused, and wary, and upset.  But what the hell gave him that right?  That was how Clint deserved to be feeling!

Phil shifted on his feet.  “But, you...when I called, you didn’t want to see me.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I called you, from the hospital.  I spent six months in a bed, begging to tell people I was alive.  But Fury told me my identity was being burned by SHIELD and that I couldn’t contact anyone.  He told me the government would shut me away if I so much as contacted one of you from the team.  But I risked it all to call you.  It took forever, but I finally tracked down a way to contact you, and you didn’t want to talk to me.”

He didn’t remember anything about that.  Not any of that!  He would remember it if Phil had _called_ him— _alive from the grave!_   But...

Phil’s jaw clenched.  “You told me you wished I had stayed dead.”

Oh!

Oh...

Clint swallowed.  “Oh, god.”

It had been six months later that the mission with Julia Hunt had happened.  And if Phil had called him right after...

“Clint?”  Phil made an aborted reach for his arm.

Clint shifted away, studying his face.  All he could see was worry, and hurt, and a little confusion.  But he couldn’t deal with it right now.  He didn’t know what else to do.  Better to finish the job, and figure this out later.  So he pulled Phil roughly into a kiss—a mashing of teeth, more like.  And for a moment, nothing else mattered, except Phil’s mouth, and his solid form, and the sound that bubbled up from his throat when Clint parted his lips.

But Phil tensed when the needle pricked his arm.  And Clint forced himself to not feel guilty.  Phil didn’t deserve his guilt.

He watched as Phil pulled back, and swallowed, eyes starting to glaze.  _More hurt more pain more confusion_.  “Why’re you dr’gging me?”

Clint caught him when he passed out.  And he paused there, for a long moment, staring at the man in his arms.  His Phil.  He pressed the pads of his fingers gently to Phil’s chest, wondering if he had a scar.  If he ever still felt sore.  If he was okay.

Shaking his head, Clint dug his earpiece from his vest pocket, and shoved at his brain to stick Clint Barton back in his box.  It was William Brandt’s mission on the line.  Ethan was screaming into the earpiece, asking if he was all right, telling him Carter was on her way to intercept.

He cleared his throat.  “Sorry.  I’m here.  My earpiece fell out while I was dealing with the mark.  No big.”

There was a pause as everyone breathed.

“Are you okay?” Ethan asked finally.

No.  Not in any way, shape, or form.

“I’m fine.”

“Will...?” Benji started, but stopped.

“The mark is unconscious,” Brandt said, instead of dealing with that.  “I’ll get him up the elevator and to the room.  Meet me there.”

“Do you need Jane to help you carry him?” Ethan offered.  “She’s almost to you.”

“No,” Brandt said, a little forcefully.  “No, I’ve got him.  He’s not heavy.”

A grown man in dead-weight was considerably heavy, but he wasn’t about to ask for help now.  As he hefted Phil up, he tried not to process the fact that it was Phil in _dead-weight_ , because...well, no, he wasn’t going there.  Apparently Phil was very much alive.

 

..

..

..

 

**Tuesday: 6:02pm**

**Waldorf-Astoria: Room #624**

The team got Phil trussed up to a chair in their hotel room in almost record time.  Benji scanned his fingerprints and began running the program.  Ethan peeled off his fake face and began applying a new one.  He would play the buyer now.

Clint—Brandt—didn’t know if he should stop them now or just let this play out.  Phil would probably be waking up soon, even though it was a bit early.  He had always reacted well to drugs.  Maybe when he woke up though, after they spiked his bloodstream with the serum that Benji claimed would loosen his tongue, Phil might...well, maybe he would answer Clint’s questions.

“Eh, something’s wrong, guys,” Benji said, with a worrying tone, from his seat at the table set up behind Coulson.  He started tapping more furiously on his laptop.

“What now?” Ethan asked, fluffing a scarf now hung around his neck to hide the edge of the mask better.

“He’s not popping up in the database,” Benji announced.  “We have nothing on him.”

Brandt began to pace short circuits across the room, unable to look at Coulson anymore.  Maybe he really should say something to the team.

Ethan turned to look at Jane.  “I thought you—”

She shrugged.  “That’s what the man said.  I never saw it.  I just saw the record entry.”

“So what now?” Benji asked.  “Is there another record we could hack to figure out this guy’s story?”

“Afraid not,” Phil’s voice cut into the conversation, making Brandt’s three teammates jump.  “I prefer a certain level of...anonymity.”

Brandt froze, unable to turn and face him.  He didn’t know how to do this...!

Ethan jumped into action, stepping away from the table and circling Coulson to stared down at the man.  “I’m afraid, Mr. Temritt, that you are being detained for just a bit.  You see, you have something I want.  And I think we can work together.”

Phil mumbled a curse, which was very unlike him.  His eyes never left Ethan’s face though, as he studied the agent with a questioning expression.  “What are you talking about?”

“The codes,” Ethan said.  “I want them.  You know how to get them.”

“It doesn’t mean I’m going to hand them over,” Phil challenged.  “Here’s a surprising fact of the day, Mr.—“

“Mr. Stone,” Ethan supplied.

“No, you’re not,” Phil said.  “But that’s fine if you want to stay in character.  What you should know though, is that I am not actually planning to use the codes, except to reel in Mr. Stone.  I don’t even have the authentic ones with me.”

Ethan paused to consider that.  “Why are you doing this?”

“Because I work for a government agency called the SSIA.”

“Never heard of it,” Ethan said.

“We deal in a...very select area of work.”

Brandt turned on his heel, unable to stand it anymore.  “The SSIA?  As in, Rufus Turner?”

Ethan looked surprised at his interruption, but he stepped back just a bit, as if turning over the floor to Brandt.

Phil looked a little surprised as well.  “I didn’t know you were cleared...?”

Brandt swallowed.  “That’s the most dangerous branch of the government I’ve ever heard of.  What the hell are you doing working with them?”  They didn’t just do crazy dangerous missions—their lives _were_ crazy dangerous missions once they were in the program.  Brandt had met an agent nine months back, while working as the Secretary’s chief analyst.  He knew the program was a shit-storm, even though he knew next to nothing about what they actually _did_.

Phil broke eye contact.  “Well...my life hasn’t exactly...it hasn’t been too worth caring about in the last year, so I thought I’d at least do something different.”

“God...”  Clint shook his head.

“Why do you care what I do?”

Brandt forced his body to loosen, dropping the tension and pushing _Clint_ back down.  He opened his eyes again.  “Tell my team what they need to know about the codes.”  Then he calmly took a step towards the undead man.

Phil’s jaw clenched.  “And if I don’t...?”

“If you don’t, I beat you to a pulp.”  Somehow he kept his voice from wavering at that.

Phil looked from him, to the rest of the team.  “Somehow, I’m not sure you would do that,” he said, very slowly, as if not quite sure.

That made him furious.  He leaned in closer, his voice dropping low and cold.  “Right now, I don’t give a rat’s ass what you feel sure of.  When I’m mad enough, I can do a hell of a lot of damage.”

Behind his bland face, Clint could see the beginnings of worry blooming in Phil’s eyes.  “I must admit, I’m a little _surprised_ by these events.”

“Oh, _you’re_ surprised?” Clint asked.  “How do you think—damn it!  Stay there and shut up for a moment.  You want to know what I printed not five minutes before you woke up?”  He turned and dug through his bag for a simple manila folder.  Then he crossed the room again and brought the file over for Phil to see, opening it to the first page.

Phil only needed a quick glance, before his eyes were back on Clint’s face, holding all the shock and worry and pain in the world.  (Clint forced himself to ignore that.)  “Would you really...?”

He clenched his jaw, forcing his voice to stay steady.  “If you refuse to help, I’ll sign them.  I’m as serious as I’ll ever be.”

Phil didn’t look away.  “I’ll tell you what you need to know.  My team’s exact operation is not a part of that though.”

“Just help them get the codes,” Clint said tiredly, closing the folder and dropping it on Phil’s lap.

He turned and left the room, heading next door to throw up or something equally wonderful.

 

..

..

..

 

**Tuesday: 6:58pm**

**Waldorf-Astoria: Room #626**

 

Nearly thirty minutes after having left Phil with his team, the man came and found him in the bathroom, sitting on the tile with his knees tucked up under his forehead.

“It occurred to me just a few minutes ago,” Phil said, “that maybe we had a big misunderstanding.”

Clint sighed, lifting his head.  “I don’t remember you calling.  Why the hell didn’t you come see me in person?”

“SHIELD was watching me,” Phil said regretfully.  “I’d only been fully awake for two months, and I was still in the hospital when I managed to figure out how to contact you.”

Clint swallowed a lump in his throat.  “If you called when I think you did, I was in a bad spot.  I was sent on a mission to protect someone, and she...she died.  And I couldn’t take it.  I’d been ignoring everything for months, telling myself that if I just kept it boxed up, I could go on, but when she died, it just, it almost killed me.”  He shrugged.  “I guess it was when I finally started realizing you were really gone.”

Phil sighed, and moved to settle on the floor of the doorway, not trying to move any closer.  “You sounded so upset when I told you I was okay...”

Clint shook his head.  “I was probably also high out of my mind on anti-depressants the psych department was putting me through.  I have a five week blur in my memory still.  Everything was a little grey at that time.”

Phil looked pained.  “I know what you mean.”

“Why didn’t you try to contact me again?”

Phil stopped meeting his eyes.  “SHIELD found out about the phone call.  Naturally, they couldn’t do much because they had burned my identity and I was only going to be with them until I was mostly healed.  But they threatened things.  Said they wouldn’t allow it to happen again.  And I thought...well, even with the way the conversation went, I somehow kind of...expected you to come get me.  When you didn’t....”

Clint swallowed.  It was his turn to look away.  “The drugs I was on.  They had me hallucinating sometimes.  Not often, but enough that I knew it was happening.  I saw you and heard you so much during those weeks, you wouldn’t believe it.  But you were never there for long.  I talked to you, and I let you brush your hand through my hair, and I yelled at you, and it never made any difference.  You were never there when the haze of each round of pills started to lift.”

There was a choked sound from Phil’s direction that had Clint lifting his head.  He was shocked to see actual tears forming in Phil’s eyes.  He looked so sad.  So hurt.

“I’m sorry,” Phil choked out, barely a whisper.  “I didn’t know.”

That was when Clint decided they were both idiots.  He stood slowly, with a slight wince from having sat unmoving on tile for too long.  Then he crossed the bathroom, and pulled Phil up to stand in front of him.  He pushed Phil until he was leaning his back against the doorframe, and then stood there for a moment, staring.

He wasn’t sure if he pushed forward, or if Phil pulled, but then they were kissing, and he was pressing his very alive husband up against the doorframe.  And for the moment, nothing else mattered.

Later they would curl up together on Clint’s bed and go over the whole story together.  Later they would do more than kiss.  Later they would figure out where they stood now.  And later Clint would admit that never in a million years would he have signed the divorce papers he had threatened Phil with.

For now, they were exactly where they needed to be.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just so you know, Phil Coulson now works for a government agency that is mentioned in my Supernatural crossovers...! So there are hints that suggest another fandom. ;p It is not super important that you get the reference. lol

**Tuesday: 4:17am**

**Waldorf-Astoria: Room #726**

Phillip Coulson, aka Richard Temritt currently, woke with a start, automatically reaching for the other side of the bed.  But his hand met a rumple of sheets and the edge of a pillow instead.  He sat up, quickly, searching for someone, only to realize when his brain caught up that there was no one else there.

Again.

It wasn’t the first time this had happened.  When he had been married to Clint, they had gotten so in the habit of waking to each other’s nightmares, that sudden noises or movements in bed caused both of them to jolt awake and check on the other.

Except that had been two years ago.  And Phillip Coulson was still alone.

He sighed, and tried to settle back into bed.  He tried to force his mind to stop thinking about Clint.  It would do no good.  He knew from extensive experience.

But it had been hard enough to fall asleep the first time.  He was having more trouble than usual pushing the memories back so that he could close his eyes.  It certainly didn’t help that this was the very hotel he had used to propose...

..

..

..

**Tuesday: 6:35am**

**Waldorf-Astoria: Room #726**

Coulson checked and double checked that the codes were hidden in the safe, and that the special preventative lining was still in place.  He also lifted the rug by the door, and checked under the one by the safe to make sure the markings were still painted on the floor.

All was in place.  His drop tonight was important.  He was pretending to be a terrorist, in order to get to a certain man.  His agency had reason to believe this man was in charge of a large force that was getting ready to target their country.  They were sending out some of their best agents, though their two best were otherwise occupied for something apparently bigger.  (And wasn’t that a terrifying thought—that there was some other threat currently on the country than what Coulson was being sent in to deal with?  He wasn’t used to that.)

..

..

..

**Tuesday: 2:00pm**

**Waldorf-Astoria: Lobby**

For a split second, he thought he saw Clint across the lobby of the hotel.  But it couldn’t be.  Clint wouldn’t come for him here.  Not after all this time.  He could still remember the last time he had talked to his husband, a year and a half ago.

_“Stay away from me!” Clint yelled into the other end of the line._

_Coulson flinched, almost dropping the phone.  “But Clint, I—”_

_“Why couldn’t you stay dead?” Clint shouted, almost pleaded.  “I didn’t want this!”_

Coulson swallowed to keep from breaking down in the middle of a luxury hotel lobby.  He continued on his way, briefcase in hand, to turn it in to the other STEALTH agents.  They would need it for tonight if everything went according to plan.

This wasn’t the time for personal issues.

..

..

..

**Tuesday: 5:07pm**

**Waldorf-Astoria: Banquet Room**

Coulson was searching the room for anyone who looked as out of place as he felt.  He knew that Stone’s goons would be coming to collect him from the gala at any moment, but he wasn’t sure how long he could stand to wait if he had to keep mingling with these atrocious socialites.  He was in no mood for this.  He had already thought he spotted Clint twice more that day, and it was wearing on him enough that Donner had asked him if he was all right.  If even Donner noticed he was off kilter, then Phil was not all right.

So he forced himself to settle under the old guise of Phillip Coulson, SHIELD badass, and straightened his posture as he passed by a small group of socialites there for the gala.

A few minutes later, he sensed someone’s eyes on him.  He felt sick, because he suddenly realized who was watching him.

Phil turned.

Clint was standing there, face as blank as possible, but eyes almost bleeding with pain.

Phil took a step towards him, without even meaning to.  And then Clint was turning and heading to a side exit.  Phil knew he should stay.  Knew he couldn’t leave lest their country get overrun by the worst things of his nightmares.  But he couldn’t help it.  Clint was there!  Clint was _there_ , and he had to go talk to him.

He slipped through the doorway, and found Clint standing with his back to the door, trembling.  He moved to take something from his ear—an earpiece?  Was he on a job?  With whom?  What was he doing now?

“What’s going on?” Clint asked, his voice rough.

“I’m undercover for a branch of the government related to SHIELD,” Phil answered truthfully, not willing to lie about anything at a time like this.  “How did you find me?”  He couldn’t figure out why Clint thought _now_ was the best time to finally seek him out.  Especially if they were both working.  Not that he was complaining.

“I didn’t,” Clint answered.  “My team was sent to intercept you.  We were expecting a terrorist.”

Phil swallowed.  So he hadn’t come to see Phil...  He just wanted to get to the terrorist that Phil was pretending to be.  “Sorry to disappoint,” he said after a long moment.  And then he couldn’t help himself.  “Are you...still mad?”

“Still mad?” Clint asked, spinning around in a furious fashion.  “What the _hell_ are you talking about?  Of course I’m mad!  You fucking _died_!  You _died_ , and now you’re _alive_ , and how was I supposed to know?  Were you ever going to tell me?  Or was I only part of your persona as Phil Coulson, badass SHIELD Agent?”

Phil’s brain choked on that accusation.  “But, you...when I called, you didn’t want to see me.”  _Ever again,_ his brain tacked on what his mouth refused to.

“What are you talking about?” Clint growled.

“I called you, from the hospital,” Phil ground out between his teeth.  “I spent six months in a bed, begging to tell people I was alive.  But Fury told me my identity was being burned by SHIELD and that I couldn’t contact anyone.  He told me the government would shut me away if I so much as contacted one of you from the team.  But I risked it all to call you.  It took forever, but I finally tracked down a way to contact you, and you didn’t want to talk to me.”

Clint didn’t say anything for a long moment.

Phil ground his teeth.  “You told me you wished I had stayed dead.”

Then Clint paled.  “Oh, god.”

“Clint?”  He reached for the man, but stopped.

Clint took a step back, studying him with those eyes that saw so much.  Then the next thing he knew, he was being pulled into a rough kiss by Clint.  And he lost himself in it.  It was harsh, and their teeth scraping together, but it didn’t matter because it was also the best kiss in the world.

Until he felt the needle prick his arm.

Phil started, and looked at Clint in shock.  He swallowed, but he could already feel the drugs kicking in.  “Why’re you dr’gging me?” he accused.

But the world had begun to spin, and he felt himself going down.  He only hoped Clint would still be there when he woke up.

..

..

..

**Tuesday: 6:02pm**

**Waldorf-Astoria: Room #624**

Phil woke to the ever-familiar feeling of being secured against a chair.  He made no move or sound to show that he was awake though.  Better to figure out what was going on and whom he was with first.

“Eh, something’s wrong, guys,” a voice said, sounding worried.

Phil tried not to flinch.

“What now?” another man said.  It sounded like Stone, Phil’s mark, but there was something off about it too.

“He’s not popping up in the database,” the first voice announced.  “We have nothing on him.”

“I thought you—“

A third voice, female this time, broke in.  “That’s what the man said.  I never saw it.  I just saw the record entry.”

“So what now?” the first voice said.

Where the hell was Clint?  Was he even there?  Phil couldn’t stand to sit there and wait any longer.

“Is there another record we could hack to figure out this guy’s story?” the first voice continued.

“Afraid not,” Phil said, lifting his head and opening his eyes.  “I prefer a certain level of...anonymity.”

Clint was there, with his back turned, looking stiff and upset.

“I’m afraid, Mr. Temritt,” the second voice said, a familiar face, “that you are being detained for just a bit.  You see, you have something I want.  And I think we can work together.”

Phil mumbled a _Cristo_ , under his breath, but it seemed like no one even caught it.  He stared at the man before him, and knew this was bad.  This man had the right face, but he wasn’t right.  There was something all wrong in the way he held himself.  Phil could see it now.

“What are you talking about?” he risked asking of the man.

“The codes,” the lookalike said.  “I want them.  You know how to get them.”

“It doesn’t mean I’m going to hand them over,” Phil said.  “Here’s a surprising fact of the day, Mr.—“

“Mr. Stone,” the man supplied.

“No, you’re not,” Phil retorted.  “But that’s fine if you want to stay in character.”  He was starting to figure this out.  If Clint was involved, this was probably a government op.  Either this wasn’t Mr. Stone, or the real mark had left.  “What you should know though,” he continued, “is that I am not actually planning to use the codes, except to reel in Mr. Stone.  I don’t even have the authentic ones with me.”

If Clint was working for a government branch, it would be best that his coworkers realize Coulson wasn’t actually a terrorist—since Clint had likely not bothered to mention it, based on the current situation.

The lookalike paused.  “Why are you doing this?”

Coulson shrugged.  “Because I work for a government agency called the SSIA.”  It didn’t matter if they recognized the name, few did.

“Never heard of it,” the man said.

Coulson tilted his head in understanding.  “We deal in a...very select area of work.”

For some reason, that was what finally got Clint to turn around.  “The SSIA?  As in, Rufus Turner?” he asked, naming the head of the branch.

The lookalike glanced at Clint and took a tiny step back.

Phil wasn’t sure what to say.  “I didn’t know you were cleared...?”  When had that happened?  Very, _very_ few people were cleared to be in the know-how on the SSIA’s operations.

Clint looked upset.  “That’s the most dangerous branch of the government I’ve ever heard of.  What the hell are you doing working with them?”

Clint was...worried for him?  He didn’t even know what to do with that.  So he looked away in shame.  “Well...my life hasn’t exactly,” he hesitated, but knew he had to be honest.  “It hasn’t been too worth caring about in the last year, so I thought I’d at least do something different.”

“God...” Clint whispered.

“Why do you care what I do?” Phil dared to ask.

It was like Clint refocused his brain on the other matter at hand.  His whole stance changed as he forced himself to calm down and hide his thoughts from Phil again.  “Tell my team what they need to know about the codes.”  He took a step closer after that, as if daring Phil to do otherwise.

“And if I don’t...?” Phil questioned.

“If you don’t, I beat you to a pulp.”  Clint’s voice was cold as ice.

Phil felt a shiver run down his spine, but he ignored it, keeping his face calm.  “Somehow, I’m not sure you would do that,” he said slowly.  He wasn’t sure, but he also had to admit it wasn’t out of the realm of possibilities he could imagine.

Clint was suddenly furious.  “Right now, I don’t give a rat’s ass what you feel sure of.  When I’m mad enough, I can do a hell of a lot of damage.”

How could Phil forget that?  There was no need to be reminded.

Phil considered his options.  “I must admit, I’m a little _surprised_ by these events.”

“Oh, _you’re_ surprised?” Clint all but yelled.  “How do you think—damn it!” he shouted, breaking it off before he could say it.  He fixed Coulson with a deadly glare.  “Stay there and shut up for a moment,” he ordered.  “You want to know what I printed not five minutes before you woke up?”

Phil waited as Clint dug through a bag for a manila folder.  He brought it closer to Phil and opened it for him to read.

Phil felt a pang in his chest that rivaled the pain of being stabbed by Loki.  Clint was holding a set of divorce papers in his hand, open for Phil to read.  The blank spaces left for the Spouse A to sign was a haunting image, with Clint’s name printed beside it.

He looked up at the man he had given his heart and soul and body to nearly six years ago.  “Would you really...?”

Clint’s eyes ran cold.  “If you refuse to help, I’ll sign them.  I’m as serious as I’ll ever be.

Phil could fell his heart cracking in his chest.  “I’ll tell you what you need to know,” he said.  “My team’s exact operation is not a part of that though.  If Clint’s team didn’t know what the SSIA did, it would be better for everyone if they kept their innocence.

“Just help them get the codes,” Clint said in an exhausted tone.  Then he closed the folder and dropped it on Phil’s lap, leaving the room silently.

For a long and painful moment, no one moved.  Phil barely even breathed.  But then he couldn’t help looking down to stare at the folder on his lap.  He heard the motion before he saw the lookalike draw near and take the folder.

“What is it?” the other male voice asked from behind him.

The lookalike opened the folder.  “Divorce papers.”

“Divorce papers?” the woman squawked.  She hurried over to have a look, as did the tech guy.  Then they all turned to stare at Phil.

He sighed and looked away.  “It’s a long _fucking_ story,” Phil ground out, not wanting to go there.  “Suffice to say my death was faked—against my will—and then when I tried to tell him I was okay, he told me I should have stayed dead.”

The team looked at each other awkwardly.

Phil shook his head.  “Untie me, and I’ll get you the codes you need.  I just need to make a phone call to my boss.”

..

..

..

**Tuesday: 6:58pm**

**Waldorf-Astoria: Room #624**

“He’s next door,” Benji told Phil, once the codes were accepted and authenticated.

Phil looked up.  “What?”

“Brandt.  He’s next door.  Six-twenty-six.”  Benji nodded his head in that direction.  “You should go talk to him.”

“And what makes you think he’ll want to hear from me just now?” Coulson asked tiredly.

Benji studied his face for a moment, before grimacing.  “Because he woke up screaming for you last night at four in the morning.”

Phil froze.  “Wait, six-twenty-six?”  That was the room right under his own.  Was that why he’d woken up last night?

“Yeah, man.  First door on your left.  He still cares about you.  And granted, I know almost nothing about your situation, like at all, we’ve never even officially heard of you from him.  But...I’ve heard him talk to you in his sleep before.  It hasn’t been too uncommon really.  And I know how he feels about you.  I don’t know what it is, but there’s still gotta be something there.”  Benji reached into a pocket and pulled out a room keycard.

Phil tried to find any hint of untruth in the man’s eyes, but Benji seemed to believe every word he was saying.

“I called him, a year and a half ago,” Phil argued.  “He told me he wished I’d stayed dead.”

“Are you sure the situation is so simple?” Benji asked.

What had Clint said earlier...?  _“You were fucking_ dead _, and now you’re_ alive _!  And how was I supposed to know?”_

Phil pushed out of his chair, taking the out-held keycard.  “I’ve got to go talk to him.”

Benji nodded and waved.  “Six-twenty-six.”

Phil let himself in to the room next door.  Clint wasn’t on either of the beds.  He also wasn’t anywhere in sight.  But something told him to check the bathroom.

And there he found Clint curled up on the floor, head on his knees, the room smelling vaguely of puke.

“It occurred to me,” Phil began, “just a few minutes ago, that maybe we had a big misunderstanding.”

Clint sighed and looked up.  “I don’t remember you calling.  Why the hell didn’t you come see me in person?”

“SHIELD was watching me,” Phil said, though that was hardly an excuse.  “I’d only been fully awake for two months, and I was still in the hospital when I managed to figure out how to contact you.”

Clint swallowed visibly.  “If you called when I think you did, I was in a bad spot.  I was sent on a mission to protect someone, and she...she died.  And I couldn’t take it.  I’d been ignoring everything for months, telling myself that if I just kept it boxed up, I could go on, but when she died, it just, it almost killed me.”  He paused to shrug.  “I guess it was when I finally started realizing you were really gone.”

Phil sighed, and moved to settle in the floor of the doorway, though he knew better than to move any closer.  “You sounded so upset when I told you I was okay...” he began.

Clint shook his head.  “I was probably also high out of my mind on anti-depressants the psych department was putting me through.”  Clint hesitated for a moment, then added, “I have a five week blur in my memory still.  Everything was a little grey at that time.”

Phil remembered his own drugged-up months in the SHIELD hospital ward.  “I know what you mean.”

“Why didn’t you try to contact me again?” Clint asked quietly, but not accusingly this time.

Phil looked away.  “SHIELD found out about the phone call.  Naturally, they couldn’t do much because they had burned my identity and I was only going to be with them until I was mostly healed.  But they threatened things.  Said they wouldn’t allow it to happen again.  And I thought...well, even with the way the conversation went, I somehow kind of...expected you to come get me.”  He was pretty sure he wasn’t keeping as much emotion out of his voice as he had aimed for.  “When you didn’t....”

Clint looked down then.  “The drugs I was on,” he said quietly.  “They had me hallucinating sometimes.  Not often, but enough that I knew it was happening.  I saw you and heard you so much during those weeks, you wouldn’t believe it.  But you were never there for long.”

Phil felt his heart breaking just a little bit more, at that.

“I talked to you, and I let you brush your hand through my hair, and I yelled at you, and it never made any difference.  You were never there when the haze of each round of pills started to lift.”

Phil couldn’t be blamed for the sound he made.  He also wasn’t ashamed of the tears in his eyes.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered when Clint looked up.  “I didn’t know.”

Clint watched him for a moment, as if measuring.  And then he began to stand.  Phil wiped a hand at his eyes, and watched him come closer.  He let Clint help him up from the floor, and let Clint move him closer to the doorframe.

For a moment, they just looked at each other, drinking in each other’s face.

Then they were leaning forward into a kiss.  And Clint was pressing him into the doorframe like he would never let Phil leave again.  And that was better than anything in the world.  So much better than the kiss outside the Banquet Room earlier.  It was like coming home.

..

..

..

**Tuesday: 9:34pm**

**Waldorf-Astoria: Room #626**

Phil pulled Clint a little closer against him as they lay in Clint’s bed.  The skin-to-skin sensation was so comforting, so _safe_ , after two years of missing it like air.  Clint hummed contentedly against his neck, from where his head had become tucked against Phil’s shoulder.

They had already gone over their respective stories, telling each other what had really happened in the past two years.  Then Clint had spent a long time remapping every inch of Phil’s skin.  Now they were just lying there, comfortably, without a care in the world other than to not move any time soon.

Phil felt his mind drifting, but he was too tired to care.  If he fell asleep, he knew Clint would still be there when he woke up.

Until a thought came to mind, and he couldn’t push it away like all the others.

“What?” Clint huffed, breath running across his chest.

Phil kissed his forehead.

“What?” Clint repeated.  “Stop stalling.”

Phil could hardly explain how happy it made him to know that Clint still knew him better than anyone in the world.  “I was just...thinking.”

“About...?” Clint asked.  “If you could hurry this up, I’d really like to fall asleep on my super hot, super not-dead husband sometime soon.”

Phil swallowed.  “The...divorce papers?”

Clint sighed, and lifted his head to meet Phil’s eyes.  “I wouldn’t have ever signed them.  Not in a million years.  Not if you faked your death all over again.  You’re mine, dead or alive.”  He kissed Phil deeply then, to drive that point home.

When they finally paused for breath, Clint leaned back again, smiling sadly.  “I didn’t know if it still mattered to you, but I wanted you to know I was serious.  I couldn’t think of any other way.”

“Okay,” Phil said, nodding his head.  “Okay.”

Clint let himself move back on top of Phil, tucking his head against his neck again.

Phil waited for a moment, not sure if he should say anything else.  But he knew he had to.  “I never...I mean, I took our vows seriously six years ago,” he said quietly.  “I never broke them, and I never stopped honoring them.”

Clint ran his thumb against Phil’s chest, tracing the scar.  “I never did either,” he admitted.  “Not even though I thought you were dead.  You’re it for me, Phil.  There can’t _be_ anyone else now.”

Phil closed his eyes in relief, and gratitude, and in a sheer overwhelming sense of peace.  He pulled his husband closer to him again, if possible, and set about running his hand up and down the man’s arm until he fell asleep.

..

..

..

**Tuesday: 10:42pm**

**Waldorf-Astoria: Room #624**

“What do you mean you can’t get your flash-drive?” Ethan asked, sounding completely annoyed and stressed out.  “Your room is right next door.  Grab it and we can do the drop.”

Benji winced.  “Brandt’s in there with his husband, man.  I’m not interrupting that.  I don’t need to _see_ that!”

“Benji...”

“You go!  I don’t need to see that!”

Ethan huffed, glancing at the door as if debating going himself.  “Um, we can...Carter?”

She shrugged.  “Yeah, sure, I mean if we really need to get the flash-drive I guess I can—”

Ethan cut her off there.  “I was just going to ask how long we can delay the drop actually.”

She cleared her throat.  “Ah right.  Well, we uh...we can probably wait another hour or two if needed, before we get underway.  The flight isn’t for another four hours.”

Ethan nodded.  “Okay.  We wait.  Go uh, go take a break or something.  We’ll reconvene at half past midnight.”


End file.
